“Well, well,” she said aloud. Only a few hours earlier, she’d been ready to abandon all hope of keeping up with her daily exercises. The cramped confines of the old farmhouse had defeated her. But now, if they did decide to stay the week in New Boston, she had a solution to her dilemma—a dance and exercise studio only seven miles from the farm.
A half dozen young girls came out of the building in a rush, all laughing and talking. Most of them were lugging tote bags of one sort or another, but one carried an old-fashioned hatbox with a wrist strap. That sight brought a nostalgic smile to Liss’s face.
“Are we planning to sit here all day?” Dan inquired.
“No, but do you see that sign? If we do stay beyond the weekend, I’ll want a decent workout. That looks like the perfect place to get one.”
“Are we going to stay?”
“Not if you don’t want to, but I’m still in favor of taking some time for the two of us. You know . . . relax. Goof off.”
“Except for the occasional exercise class? Go ahead.” Dan made a shooing motion. “Find out if they accept walk-ins, just in case we stay on.” His tender smile told her that was more and more likely. “I’ll wait here.”
She leaned across the seat to kiss him on the cheek, then hopped out of the truck.
At some point in its history, the dance studio had been a retail store with a small display window to one side of the door. A red velvet curtain shielded the interior from gawking passersby and served as a backdrop for three neatly lettered signs. One announced an upcoming ballet recital. The second was a list of the classes offered by the studio. Liss was impressed by the variety of choices. Dance-Ex instructors taught the standards—ballet, tap, and ballroom—but there were also lessons in yoga, aerobics, rhythmic gymnastics, and something called “advanced stretching.”
The third sign was tucked away in a corner, smaller than the other two. PRIVATE LESSONS AVAILABLE IT READ. SURPRISE YOUR WIFE OR SWEETHEART. LEARN YOUR WAY AROUND THE DANCE FLOOR. THEN SHOW HER A NIGHT SHE’LL NEVER FORGET.
What a sweet idea, Liss thought, although she couldn’t imagine that the offer had many takers. Learning ballroom dancing would not be high on the to-do list of most of the men she knew.
The door to the studio opened directly into a large room. A barre was attached to one wall. Mirrors covered the one opposite. Windows filled the third. The curtains were open to reveal a small parking lot at the rear of the building. The layout was pretty much what Liss would have found in hundreds of small dance studios across the country. A bit out of the ordinary were the half dozen colorful mats spread out across the floor. Ditto the rolling cart piled high with assorted weights and other exercise paraphernalia. A second cart held the balls, hoops, clubs, and colorful ribbons used in rhythmic gymnastics.
“Hello!” Liss called. “Anyone here?”
The mirrored wall was bisected by a single door. A tall, athletic-looking woman with short blond hair emerged through the beaded curtain that hung across it. Liss caught only a glimpse of the narrow corridor behind her, but she could guess what else was there. On one side would be an office, a bathroom, and maybe a small storage room. Perhaps even a minuscule kitchen. A large room for the little girls to change in—street clothes to leotards and back again—would take up the space on the other side of the hallway. It would be furnished with benches to sit on while they tied the ribbons on their toe shoes, and if this was a really classy place, there might be lockers in which the students could stow their personal belongings while they attended class.
Although her own focus had always been on Scottish dancing, Liss had taken her share of lessons in other disciplines. Fond memories of her first ballet teacher, Miss Winona, had her greeting the blonde with more warmth than she usually extended to strangers.
“Sorry to barge in,” Liss said, “but I couldn’t resist when I saw your sign. Perhaps you know my good friend Zara Kalishnakof? She and her husband own Dance Central in Moosetookalook. The three of us worked together for years in a Scottish dance troupe called—”
“Is there something I can do for you?” the woman interrupted. She wasn’t rude so much as impatient, an impression reinforced when she glanced at her watch.
Liss kept her friendly smile in place. The blonde probably had another class coming in and had been counting on the time between sessions to prepare. Or maybe she’d been trying to grab a bite to eat. As someone who ran a one-person business herself, Liss could sympathize.
“Sorry. I’ll get to the point. I’m in this area for a week, and I was hoping I could participate in a few of your classes while I am here. You know how it is,” she added with a little laugh. “Got to keep the old muscles toned.”
“I charge thirty dollars for an hour-long session in any discipline,” the woman said. “If you need workout clothing or shoes, I can sell them to you.”
“Great. Do you have a schedule of classes?”
“Follow me.” The second glance at her watch was as unsubtle as the first. She had a long, fast stride. Liss had to scurry to keep up with her.
The office was exactly where Liss expected it would be. From the top drawer of a file cabinet, the blonde extracted a sheet of paper and handed it over.
“Is this you?” Liss indicated the name printed at the top of the page. “Juliette Cressy?”
“That’s right. Did you say you were here for a week? My usual minimum commitment is six sessions, paid in advance, but I suppose I can make an exception for you if you agree to sign up for five.”
“That’s reasonable, assuming there’s something on this list that appeals to me.”
The longer Liss spent with Juliette, the less inclined she was to bother being pleasant herself. The other woman’s brusque manner wasn’t only off-putting but catching, too.
More than ever, Liss missed Dance Central. Zara and Sandy had instituted a pay-as-you-go policy, collecting the money before the start of each class. If a student missed one, because she was sick or for some other reason, she didn’t have to pay. Liss herself used the facilities for free. She’d tried to pay when Dance Central first opened, but Zara had insisted that having her company bright and early every morning was worth more to her than money.
Dance-Ex offered a greater variety of classes than Dance Central did, but Liss couldn’t help but notice that there were no trademarked names among them. If you were looking for Jazzercise, dancercise, Zumba, or the like, you were flat out of luck in New Boston. Dance-Ex was strictly generic.
Liss shifted her gaze from the list to Juliette, taking in the other woman’s height and generous bosom. It was doubtful she’d ever been a professional ballerina. “What’s your background?” she asked.
“Does it matter? If you sign up, you’ll get a workout, and that’s what you’re interested in, right?” Juliette’s impatience had become a palpable force in the small office. Whatever she had scheduled, it was clearly much more important than luring in a new customer, especially one interested only in the short term.
“I’m looking for something each morning for the next week, but not too early.” Liss studied the page in her hand again. “I’m on vacation, you see. Besides, I’ll have to drive into town from the old Snowe place. I know it’s not all that far, but—”
She broke off when the dance instructor made a startled sound. Her head shot up, but she was already too late to catch a glimpse of Juliette’s expression. The other woman had turned away, giving Liss nothing to look at but her back.
“Did you know Simeon Snowe?” Liss asked.
“No. Not at all. Never met the man.” But the tension in Juliette’s shoulders was impossible to miss.
“I suppose everyone in New Boston heard about it when he disappeared.”
Juliette’s voice dripped ice. “Of course. The consensus of opinion was that a bear got him.”
Liss considered asking Juliette if she knew anything about the man in the netter, but decided against it. “How long have you had this dance studio?” she asked instead.
&nb
sp; “Eleven years.”
When Juliette turned, the light from the overhead fixture fell fully on her face. She was older than Liss had first thought, nearer to forty than thirty. Beneath those hard, cold eyes were the beginnings of crow’s-feet.
With an impatient gesture, Juliette indicated the sheet of paper Liss had been studying. “Why don’t you take that list home with you? If you decide to join a class, show up at the first session with a check for a hundred and fifty dollars in hand.”
Liss allowed the other woman to herd her back through the beaded curtain but balked at being shoved out the front door, even after Juliette opened it as wide as it would go and, despite the cold air that billowed in, seemed prepared to leave it open until Liss left the premises.
“I’ll be here on Monday at ten for the aerobics class,” Liss told her, deliberately lingering on the threshold.
“Good choice. See you then.”
Still dawdling, driven to be provoking in response to Juliette’s attitude, Liss finally took one slow step in the direction of the street. She pulled back sharply as a young woman rushed into the studio, nearly bowling her over in the process. There would have been a nasty collision if Liss hadn’t stepped aside in the nick of time.
“Oops! My bad!” said the newcomer.
“No harm done,” Liss assured her, but the other woman, a brunette barely out of her teens, had already shifted her attention to Juliette.
“Sorry I’m late, boss. I got held up at home. It won’t happen again. I swear. Cross my heart and hope to die.”
Liss hovered for a moment longer, wondering why the young woman was so agitated. She might be late, but no students had arrived yet for the next class.
The door closed with a decisive thump, shutting the two dance instructors in and Liss out. A distinctive click followed—a dead bolt being engaged. As Liss turned her steps toward Dan’s truck, she glanced again at the paper Juliette Cressy had given her. There were no classes scheduled on Saturdays after advanced ballet from one to two, the session that had just finished up when she and Dan arrived on the scene.
Juliette probably gave lessons to her instructors, Liss decided. She’d have to teach them the routines she choreographed for use in their classes. Given what little Liss had seen of the woman, she’d be a hard taskmaster, reason enough for her employees to be nervous around her.
From the opposite side of the street, Liss heard the driver’s side door of the truck open and shut as Dan got out. He’d been watching for her. That knowledge, and the welcome sight of him striding toward her, erased every other thought from Liss’s mind. She tucked the class schedule into her shoulder bag and quickened her pace so that they met on the sidewalk in front of All Things Mystical.
“Welcome to the wonderful world of the strange and fantastic!”
The moment Liss and Dan stepped into her shop, Rowena Luckenbill swooped down on them, her gauzy, flowing garments aflutter and beads and bangles clanking with her every movement. The loose clothing obscured the shape of her body, but nothing could disguise Rowena’s height. She had several inches on Liss, and Liss usually towered over every other woman in the room.
They grew them big in New Boston, Liss thought. Juliette Cressy was even taller than Rowena Luckenbill. Unlike Juliette, Rowena was pink-cheeked and smiling. Her sparkling blue eyes danced with barely suppressed delight. She was also somewhat older than the dance instructor. Short, fluffy snow-white hair formed a halo around her head, and close up, she smelled faintly of lavender.
She hovered at first, eager to be of assistance. “Anything you’re looking for, I can find,” she offered. “I know exactly where all my bits and bobs are shelved.”
“We’re just browsing,” Liss insisted and then felt guilty when she saw the disappointment on Rowena’s face. The poor woman probably didn’t get all that many customers. It was cruel to deprive her of an opportunity to extol the virtues of dried herbs and magic potions.
There were plenty of both in evidence. As Officer Jennings had warned them, odd-looking clumps of vegetation, none of which Liss could name, hung from the ceiling above the sales counter. Behind it, several shelves held glass jars filled with leaves, berries, and a few other substances Liss decided she would prefer not to identify. She was pretty sure one of them contained a mandrake root. Creepy!
Her gaze shifted to the sales counter itself. Incongruously, a large stuffed toy cat had been placed next to the cash register. If it had been black, she’d have seen the connection. The pairing of black cats with witches and spells had been a cliché for centuries. But this faux feline was clearly a Scottish Fold. The breed was instantly recognizable because the ears were, well, folded over. She reached out, curious, to search for a price tag and yelped in surprise when the cat opened its eyes. They stared at each other for a long, fraught moment. Then the cat yawned and went back to sleep.
Behind her, Liss heard Dan chuckle. Flushed with embarrassment, she turned to glare at him, but he’d already gone back to inspecting the contents of a bookcase on the far side of the showroom.
“I didn’t think it was real,” she muttered in her own defense.
“This is Gozer.” On a wave of lavender, Rowena Luckenbill floated to Liss’s side and extended a hand to scratch the animal behind one of his peculiar ears.
“Guard cat?”
Rowena gave a snort of laughter. “Not hardly.”
Having bonded over the cat, Liss introduced herself as the proprietor of Moosetookalook Scottish Emporium. “I’m always interested in seeing how other small businesses catering to a niche market manage. Do you get much walk-in business, or do you rely on Internet sales?”
“I’ve established a decent-size local clientele,” Rowena told her. “Early on I promoted the business by doing readings.”
“Tarot cards?” One of Rowena’s display cases showed off some of the more colorful artwork used on this classic fortune-telling tool.
“Oh, yes. I’m also proficient with a crystal ball, and I read palms. And, of course, I offer Ouija boards for sale.” She made a vague gesture that drew Liss’s attention to the whole of her shop.
Every shelf, every nook and cranny, was stuffed with oddities ranging from the whimsical to the disturbingly occult. Role-playing games were stacked alongside books on herbs, magic, witchcraft, and alien abductions. A nearby cabinet held DVDs of the complete seasons of Bewitched, Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, and Charmed, together with almost every movie featuring witches that Liss had ever heard of—everything from The Witches of Eastwick to Practical Magic.
Another of Rowena’s glass display cases contained very old books, their leather covers dark with age. Liss’s eyes widened as she stared at the gold lettering on one of them. The title was unfamiliar to her, but she knew that this was a grimoire—a serious book of spells. Such things had been the foundation of more than one paranormal thriller.
It’s a good thing I’m not superstitious, Liss thought. But she found herself edging away from the display.
Rowena had retreated behind her sales counter, but her bright-eyed gaze darted back and forth between Liss and Dan with the same avid interest a robin gave to a promising worm. She stroked the cat and asked, “Wouldn’t you like to know what the future holds?”
“I’d rather be surprised,” Liss answered. “But maybe you can help us with something. Do you know anything about mazes?”
The question sounded almost mundane in these surroundings, but it seemed to surprise the proprietor of All Things Mystical. “Well, that’s a first. Folks usually want to know about astral projection or whether or not I’ll sell them a love potion.”
“We came across one,” Liss said. “A maze.”
She glanced at Dan. Booklets were mixed in with thicker volumes in the bookcase he was examining. He was methodically pulling out each one to check the title, but she knew he was also aware of what was going on around him and he was close enough to hear what she and Rowena said to each other.
“A maze,” Ro
wena repeated. “Do you mean here in New Boston? How odd. I didn’t think anyone in these parts had the know-how to create that sort of landscaping. Or the money to waste on it.”
“This isn’t an ordinary maze.”
Rowena chuckled. “Define ordinary.”
“Hampton Court,” Liss said at once. She’d seen photos of the maze at that royal palace. It was a major British tourist attraction and featured neatly trimmed hedges and wide, easy-to-walk passages.
“And I presume you aren’t talking about a corn maze—something someone made in a field for Halloween.”
Liss shook her head. “Not exactly.”
Dan came up beside her, holding a thick black booklet in one hand. “Found one,” he announced and handed over Mazes: Ancient & Modern by Robert Field.
“Cash or charge?” Rowena asked as Dan reached for his wallet.
“Cash.”
Completing the transaction did not take long. Dan was ready to leave as soon as Rowena tucked the receipt into the bag with his purchase, but Liss knew they weren’t going to make their escape until she’d satisfied the other woman’s curiosity. She didn’t bother waiting to be asked.
“We’re staying at Simeon Snowe’s Christmas tree farm at the request of his heir,” she said. “Ms. Snowe wanted us to assess whether or not the business is still viable.”
Rowena sucked in a startled breath. Liss thought she started to cross herself, but her hand stopped partway through the gesture, fingers grasping one of the three long strings of beads she wore around her neck. “That’s where the maze is?” she asked in a hushed voice.
Liss nodded. “When we took a look around the property earlier today, there was something odd about the section where Mr. Snowe planted his last crop. It took a while to figure out what it was, but from the second floor of his house, you can see that the trees form a maze.”
“Well, for goodness’ sake! Did you go inside? I’ve always wanted to explore a real maze. It must have been fascinating.”
“We didn’t even locate the entrance.”
Ho-Ho-Homicide (A Liss MacCrimmon Mystery Book 8) Page 7
